


Wings of Freedom

by KaedeRavensdale



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: And a terrible parent but that's expected, Dragon Riders AU, Dragon shifter Eren, Eragon inspired, Kenny is Levi's father, M/M, Rider Levi, They're the Coordinate together, fifteen year old Levi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-11-13
Updated: 2017-11-17
Packaged: 2019-02-01 14:50:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,569
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12707151
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KaedeRavensdale/pseuds/KaedeRavensdale
Summary: After fifteen years spent in the Underground, doing whatever it took to survive, running illegal jobs for his father is nothing new for Levi even if targeting the Palace is far more risky than their usual mark and the accompanying instruction of 'don't touch it' is a little odd to say the least. What he didn't realize was the fact that the 'stone' he was stealing was the key to a destiny he never wanted, and that it would land him in the middle of an all out war over the fate of the Marleyan Empire which rose from the ashes of the Rider Corp.'s fall.





	1. The Odd Job

**Author's Note:**

> I've had this idea for a while and wasn't quite sure how to go about it but recently decided 'what the heck' and the result was actually quite a good deal better than I expected. I'll probably update this one a week, most likely on Fridays.

The air was thick with the metallic scent of ozone, the cloud choked sky echoing the distant growl of thunder. Wind hissed through the trees and the tall grass and wild flowers, shaking stalks and fronds together in a wild blur of life and color. With a flash of lighting the heavens split with rain, speckles of water darkening the dry soil. Falling faster and faster until hard ground was reduced to turned mud. Saturating the earth. Covering the ground with a thin skin of cold water which reflected the second flash of lightning that ripped through the sky.

In the world below the only evidence of the storm now raging over head was the choking smell of damp and what few droplets of rain could manage to stubbornly squeeze themselves through thin cracks in ancient stone. Trickling along the uneven ceiling, drawn together between the hanging fangs of rock until their combined weight became too much and they plummeted into the forgotten city of murderers and thieves which stretched below. Shattering against the brow of the raven who perched on steps of the ramshackle home where he’d been born.

Grey eyes turned upwards in time for another droplet to blind him with stinging cold. Recoiling with a hiss, he rose to his feet and scrubbed the liquid away. “Shitty weather.” Annoyed, the short-of-stature male mounted the stairs and returned inside.

The interior of the home was lit by the dim glow of stunted candles, sparsely furnished with recovered furniture and just close enough to being clean to make of itself an eternal irritant to his compulsive disorder. His father sat hunched in a three legged chair, hand splayed palm up on his left knee as his fingers traced the raised silver scar etched into the base of his thumb. He’d never seen it clearly but knew it to be circular and oddly striated and that it always seemed to bother Kenny when the weather took a turn for the cold or the wet.

He’d learned not to question him on it years ago, after the third time had left him with a badly busted lip.

“Levi.” The raven’s progress towards the rickety stairs was halted by the harsh rasp of his voice. In his youth his father might have been a handsome man but there wasn’t even a shadow of that left now amidst the harsh plains and sharp features of his bearded face. The candles around them guttered, reflecting in his piercing eyes. “Sit.”

A job, then. The mixture of relief and wariness formed a familiar bitter taste on the tip of his tongue as he approached the second chair and sat down across the table. It would be a mercy to have something more to do than wait around or go two-against-two with Farlan, even more so if the task he was about to be given was one that would take him beyond the Underground into the world above, but the streak of hesitance had reason to be there. His father wasn’t a man to let your guard down around no matter who you were, or weren’t, to him. Failure wasn’t tolerated in even the most remote of terms and it was all too common for him to withhold information he didn’t believe necessary to know.

As a result, more often than not, the three of them ended up going in blind with only the knowledge of what they were stealing-or who they were making disappear-and the cut they’d be receiving in return.

Along with how to take a man for all he hand and the proper method of ending lives with a single slash of a three inch knife, one of the first things Levi had learned was that being the son of the most feared man in the Underground afforded no mercy.

If anything, it left his noose with a much shorter drop.

“Listen to me, boy, and listen well because the instructions I’m about to give you had damn well better be followed exactly.” His open hand closed into a fist as he adjusted his position in the chair. “And you’d better make sure Church and Magnolia don’t screw this up either; it’s on your head if anything goes wrong.”

“We’ve never made a mess of things before. What makes you think this time will be different?” though Levi couldn’t deny a part of him was made extremely nervous by the unusual segue into matters.

“Watch your mouth, brat!” Though he didn’t betray his wariness outwardly the raven kept a watchful eye on the switch blade now brandished in his direction, suppressing a shudder at the sight of the splotches of red and brown adorning it. He’d seen enough blood by now to be able to differentiate it from rust. “You’re going to take Church and Magnolia and you’re going to steal…a massive emerald from the palace treasury. _Do not touch it!_ ”

Silver eyes blinked once in confusion. “Why not?”

Even after all these years the older man was quick as a snake and Levi wasn’t fast enough to dodge the strike aimed at him. He recoiled with a hiss of pain, palming at the narrow slash dripping blood down his cheek.

“I’ve told you what you need to know you little shit. Keep asking questions and I’ll cut out your tongue with this knife; it’s not as if you really need it for life down here. Of course, then you’d have to find something else to shove down Church’s throat.”

Levi hissed at him. “Disgusting bastard! We’re practically related!”

“Practically related isn’t actually related. And even if you really were brothers there’s no one down here who’d give a fuck if you were fucking. As long as it didn’t get in the way of earning your keep.” Kenny snapped his knife shut and set it on the table. “Get!”

Resisting the urge to snatch up the blade and thread it through his father’s throat Levi turned on his heel and stalked back out of the house. The rate at which the droplets fell had increased considerably in the time he’d been inside and it now almost appeared as if a budget rainstorm had taken a wrong turn.

Because he needed more aggravation in his life.

Shielding his head as best he could with his arms Levi took off down the street at a run, reaching the building where the other two members of his family-who he actually liked-lived in record time and letting himself in. The door had barely had the chance to swing shut behind him before a red and green blur had launched itself at him, knocking him back against the wood with its momentum.

“Aniki!” Isabelle’s squeal was enough to make him cringe. When she looked up and noticed the cut on his face her smile immediately dropped, expression shifting into something deadly. “You’re bleeding.”

“The bastard’s being even more restrictive with information than usual.” The raven easily slid from her grasp and walked towards the nearest chair.

“Another job come around?” Farlan appeared out of the small kitchen with three cups in one hand and a bottle in another. Levi grunted in affirmation. “What?”

“Stealing some shitty rock.” On top of inheriting Kenny’s black hair and evil scowl, he’d also inherited his vocabulary. “We’re being sent to the Capital. To the palace.”

“Ambitious.” He poured a cup and passed it to Levi, then another and passed it to Isabelle-who knocked it back without pause-and took the last for himself before sitting down. “What’s it worth?”

“Don’t know.” The raven took a drink.

“What?” The red head’s voice was a bit louder than necessary. Levi could feel a headache beginning to creep up on him. At least the cut on his face had stopped bleeding. “Your father always tells us what our cut is going to be!”

“Is he aware of what it’s worth?” Farlan asked.

“It’s not a matter of him not knowing.” The raven messaged his temples. “Some of the instructions he gave were odd as well. ‘Don’t touch it’ foremost.”

“It could be something magical, and dangerous. Reiss is a Dragon Rider. They’re known for their magic.” The dark blonde refilled his cup. Levi had to admit that the other had a point. He still didn’t like it. “Does he still think we’re secretly involved?”

“Tch!”

Farlan grinned. “You wound me.”

“I see you as a brother, Church, you’re not gay and I’m not into blondes.”

“Thank goodness for that.” Isabelle said. “I love you both but I’d rather you two not become any more involved and turn me into the third wheel.”

Levi snorted, reached out and ruffled her hair. As per usual the red head made a disgruntled sound but didn’t attempt to stop him. “Little shit.”

“When are we headed out?” Farlan asked, setting his cup aside now that the bottle was finished.

“Dawn.” Levi said.

“You’re staying the night?”

“If you can spare the space.”

“We can spare the space for you to come and live with us, Aniki.” Isabelle said. “Can’t figure out why you still live with your father if he’s such a bastard.”

“If I had the choice to move out I’d have come to live with the both of you years ago.” The raven groused, toeing off his shoes and stretching out on the couch. “But father dearest won’t let me out from under his thumb until his dies. Shitty control freak.”

“He’s almost fifty now, isn’t he?” Farlan collected the glasses once certain the other two had finished and started back towards the kitchen. “Shouldn’t be too much longer. Especially down here.”

The shorter man made a noncommittal sound in response.

“So what’s the plan?” Levi cracked one silver eye back open to peer at Isabelle, who’d leaned forward in her seat in her excitement. Because of his current position, head tilted back over the armrest of the stiff sofa, the room appeared inverted. “We’re breaking into the palace. That’s a job that’s a lot more difficult than usual. Isn’t this the part where you and Farlan cover the table with maps and start writing up an essay on the best method of attack?”

“Usually it would be. But none of us have been to the Capital before and I wasn’t given any maps or blueprints this time around. Planning before we’ve seen anything is a shitty move.” He closed his eyes again. “We’ll come up with a strategy once we’ve staked the place out. For the moment, the ‘plan’ is to get some sleep.”

Levi turned onto his side, burying his face in the worn leather in an effort to block out some of the light. He spent the next few hours drifting in and out of consciousness. Questions about the stone and its worth and why they’d been told not to touch it dogged him through the twists and turns of dreams of blood and dragons. Eventually the candles were blown out and both Farlan and Isabelle retreated to their rooms on the second floor, leaving him alone on the first in the dark. The dripping of the false rain slowed, then disappeared.

Green scales. Golden fire. A male voice, saying his name and a phrase in a language he didn’t understand yet somehow sounded like ‘my other half’.

He sprung onto all fours when a hand came down on his shoulder, relaxing when he caught sight of familiar steel-blue eyes peering at him through the gloom.

“Are you alright?” Farlan asked him, a subtle edge of concern to his voice.

Levi nodded, bangs falling into his eyes. “Fine.” He said. “Just…odd dreams.”

Odd really was the only word for them. They weren’t nightmares. But they certainly weren’t normal either. Even now the exact words, melodic in tone and metallic in construction fitted together like the rings of a gold chain, were falling through the sieve of his memory yet their meaning seemed branded into the surface of his mind.

‘My other half’.

But what did it mean?

“If you’re certain. But we should get going; it’ll take a while yet to get up to the entrance and it’s already almost daybreak.” His brother in all but blood released him then and moved to turn away, but stopped mid-way through and added “by the way, happy fifteenth birthday.”

Not that another year alive meant anything in the life they lived. Levi had forgotten the date himself a long time ago and couldn’t understand why the pair still insisted on marking the matter, even if only with their words.

He’d given up on attempting to discourage them what seemed like ages ago.

“Where’s Magnolia?” the raven asked to change the subject.

“Outside. We’re ready to head out when you are, Levi.” The blonde told him.

“No point in sitting around here.” The shorter male rose from the couch, checked his pockets and, once certain that his knife was indeed still on him, started towards the door. As Farlan had said the red head was indeed waiting outside on the step, her crossbow and quiver of bolts fastened to her narrow back. She repeated a considerably more excitable variation of the other’s well wishes to similar results and the trio started towards the passage to the world above.

The stair case was narrow, crumbling and treacherous. In places it had been destroyed, an effort no doubt on the part of the King’s soldiers to prevent the ‘scum of the earth’ from crawling up out of it, but they’d failed to take into account how reckless desperation made people. And how skillful in odd things necessity could lead one to become. Navigating the devil’s stair case through a series of risky leaps and wall climbs without falling or losing any of the equipment they’d brought with them the trio regrouped at the top before heading up along the sloping tunnel.

The pale glow of the opening was visible ahead of them now. The air sweet and cold with early morning. After checking to make sure that the members of the guard who were meant to be watching it were either blind drunk, passed out or both the intrepid group quickly left the entry way and made their way down the narrow dirt path leading away towards the town in the near distance.

The sensation of the cold, damp wind on their skin was foreign. The colors of the sunrise slowly bleeding into the washed-grey sky a rare sight. All three paused to watch the blazing orb flood the heavens with pale blue in a moment of silence which seemed to stretch on for eternity before Levi roused both of his companions with light taps to the shin.

“We’ve been out in the open for long enough.” He said, resuming the trek down the path. “We should head into Trost and focus on catching a ride to the Capital.”


	2. Motive and Opportunity

 

The trio had hidden in an alleyway until the streets became flooded with people, and had then spent the majority of the day blending in with the crowds while searching for some method of travel by which to get from Trost to Mitras in a shorter span of time than walking would allow that wouldn’t involve parting with any of their meager funds. They’d ultimately spied a hay cart being loaded with bushels full of dried golden, sweet smelling straw and had, after a good few hours hanging around the area and skillful employment of Isabelle’s large green eyes had on good confidence that its ultimate destination, though not the Capital, would take them straight through it in about a day’s time.

The trio of thieves had then bided their time until the cart was full and had just begun to move to stow away beneath the drift of cargo.

The crack of a riding crop tipped them off to the impending departure of the cart. Levi exchanged nods with Farlan, then motioned to Isabelle who had crouched behind an unoccupied produce stand and took off at a silent sprint. The wheels creaked as they began to turn, the oxen at the front snorting and lowing loudly enough that the clatter of their boarding and the hiss of disturbed hay went unnoticed. The cart was not very big and though being squeezed in together like sardines in a can wasn’t the most ideal of circumstances it was better than nothing; the three made themselves as comfortable as possible and prepared for the long stretch of hours ahead.

“Now’s the time to discuss the first stage of our plan; we’ll be stuck on this thing for the foreseeable future and there’s no sense wasting time.” Levi blew a strand of hay out of his face. “Just keep your voices down. We don’t want to give ourselves away.”

He looked rather pointedly at the red head when he said this. Isabelle nodded, wide eyed and with a semi-guilty up tilt to her lips. Farlan snickered.

“We won’t be able to determine what we’re going to do to go about liberating the hunk of rock from Reiss’ treasury until we get to Mitras and see what’s going on, and even then we’ll be going into the castle itself blind as there’s no way they’ll let us in for a shitty tour if we ask nicely, but we can at least hash out what we’ll do when we get to the Capital here.”

“That’s probably the wisest course of action.” The blonde agreed from his right. “This isn’t a job like anything we’ve ever been sent on before. The Capital is well guarded, and not just by your normal run of the mill soldiers.”

“Titans.” A collective shudder passed through all three of them at the invocation of the Marleyan Empire’s elite soldiers. “Do you think the whole ‘Dragon Rider’ business is really true, Aniki? That Dragons actually exist?”

“Dragons or no Dragons the Titans aren’t something we want to trifle with. We get in and we get out and we don’t draw more attention to ourselves than necessary.” Levi said.

“Do you think we’ll see one?” Isabelle pressed. “I want to see one. Maybe just from afar. The stories all say that the Dragons are beautiful.”

“Afar is fine.” Farlan said. “But I’d really rather we didn’t see any. But we should get back to the original subject.”

At least he wasn’t the only one of their group attempting to keep them on topic. The raven sighed in annoyance when yet another strand of straw fell in his face. “Our first concern when we get to Mitras will be making ourselves as inconspicuous as possible and blend in. We’ll achieve that by booking a cheap room to share and having a cover story for our reason to be there at hand.”

“There are a number of holy sites in the surrounding area.” The blonde pointed out. “We could always say that we’re making a pilgrimage to one of them.”

“Provided no one asks questions.”

“It’s impolite to ask about another person’s religion.” Isabelle pointed out. “Just do what you normally do if someone asks.”

“Remember how he said we’re not supposed to be drawing attention to ourselves? ‘Going to a holy site’ and ‘possessing the mouth of a sailor’ aren’t compatible ideas.”

Levi kicked him, but their position left the motion without much force. The blonde smirked at him in response. “We’ll get a room at the cheapest inn in the city, tell anyone who asks that dribble about ‘visiting a holy site’ and then spend the day staking out the city and the outside of the palace. We’ll make the rest of our plan from there and, with any luck, will be headed back towards home by tomorrow night.”

The rest of the ride was spent alternating watch between the three of them; for an hour each one would stay awake while the other two slept, passing down the line. It was cold in the back of that damned cart, the couple feet of straw that they were buried under doing very little to conserve heat, but when he slept it was warm. The touch of straw became the touch of feathers and soft skin and he heard that voice again. ‘See you soon.’

The image that stayed were glowing golden eyes. Everything else fled quickly when he jerked awake to Isabelle’s pinches, Farlan falling victim to the same treatment moments later. The Capital was just over the next hill and the trio dropped from the cart onto the rutted road it traveled; they’d walk the rest of the way so as not to appear suspicious.

“I understand the need to wake us up,” the blonde pushed his hair back from his eyes, blinking up at the rising sun in an effort to drag himself to something closer to ‘awake’, “but is shaking us too much to ask?”

“I couldn’t be sure that just shaking you would wake you up, Farlan. You sleep like a rock. And since I had to pinch you I decided I’d make it fair and just do it to both of you.”

The raven rubbed the red mark on his forearm in silence. “Don’t wake up too much; we’ll be stuck in a room at an inn for another four hours before we can even consider doing anything, and may as well use that time to sleep more.”

The Capital of the Marleyan Empire was a sprawling urban expanse which ranged from the walled in Palace and the manors of the insanely rich to the crumbling shacks of the poor which wouldn’t have looked out of place in the Underground. It was no doubt a harder life to live up here, where crime was not so easily covered up amidst the roiling soup of ever increasing incidences of robbery assault and murder and too little manpower to handle it all, but even still Levi couldn’t help but envy them. Even if they were treated like living trash, even if they were barely more than walking skeletons in some cases, at least they could see the sun and the moon every day and night. At least they could feel the wind. At least they got real rain and real snow.

The Underground was hell, even to its demonic princes. Dark and claustrophobic. Always smelling of earth and rock. Walls to either side. A ceiling overhead almost everywhere. You couldn’t pull yourself out of anything down there. Not really. Couldn’t spread your wings. Couldn’t fly.

Something inside of him shifted and something outside of him, far off and barely connected, shifted as well. Turned itself in the confines of a circular prison. He could sense an eagerness to be free that belonged to something else, mixing with his own into something potent and hard to ignore.

“Are you alright?” He turned his head. Farlan and Isabelle were both watching him with concern. “Levi, your eyes are dilated.”

A grunted affirmation of something along the lines of ‘fine’ didn’t seem to put them much at ease. The raven scrubbed at his eyes in hopes of coaxing his pupils back to normal size. “There shouldn’t be trouble finding reasonable room and board in a Hanging Dog district like this one. These people will be desperate enough to take just about any offer.”

It was cruel, in many ways, to prey on that desperation but that was what they were. Cruel. Ruthless. There was no place for mercy, or regrets, where they came from. As much as he liked to pretend he was callous enough that it didn’t bother him anymore, sometimes being heartless was more difficult than it should have been.

The ‘inn’ they ultimately settled on was a three story building which looked about ready to collapse around their ears. Moldering in places. Dirty. Probably had a terrible infestation of rats. Levi tried not to think about it, and with how tired he was it was easy not to. They paid pittance for a tiny room and all curled up together on a bed which only barely seemed capable of supporting their weight, sleeping until midday. By then the streets were full of people and the market was lively enough that the fruit and bread they swiped, both for then and for later on the way back to Trost, went unnoticed.

No one so much as looked in their direction, too absorbed in going about their daily business, which suited the three of them just fine. It was probably for the better that they never had to put forward their cover story, or deal with the potential subsequent complications.

It happened when they were halfway up the steep path leading to the looming palace gates; the thing descended onto a nearby boulder with the flutter of massive wings and coiled down to sun itself and all three of them stopped dead in their tracks. Smoke curled from the dragon’s muzzle as it observed them with a single black eye, gaze heavy and bored. Horns, charred black and razor sharp, curled upwards over its narrow head and the scales which covered its body appeared to have been carved from chips of amber, contrasting with the golden feathers on its wings and tail.

“Sweet Maria,” Farlan hissed as Isabelle continued to stare at the now sleeping beast, “they _are_ real.”

“If there’s one there’s more. Let’s finish up and get out of here before another one shows up and decides it’s less interested in a cat nap than it is in eating the three of us!” The blonde was all too happy to comply but the pair had to drag the red head along behind them and around the far corner of the wall. “We’re not getting any closer than this, so we’ll have to make do with what we can gather from here.”

“There’s no way we’re getting that gate open, Aniki.” Isabelle said. “From the look of it it would take three of those dragons to pull open. There’s probably a winch on the other side but that wouldn’t do us much good in getting through.”

She was right. The raven made a disappointed noise and turned his head up to peer at the wall above them, running his fingers along the uneven surface. It would be incredibly dangerous, but under the cover of darkness and with a bit of the tar they’d brought with them applied to his shoes he could manage it.

“I’ll climb.” He told them. “Not much other choice. And it’s better that I go alone; the fewer people we have in the palace itself the fewer people who can accidentally attract the attention of anyone inside.”

“You’ll need a distraction outside, though.” Isabelle pointed out. “I’m good at that! I’ve got your back on this one Aniki!”

It was clear from the half-amused expression on Farlan’s face that he was resisting the urge to say ‘yes, you are’. “I’ll make sure she doesn’t get herself in over her head.”

Levi nodded, then peered around the corner at the dragon which had all but dropped out of the sky on top of them on their way up. The titanic reptile still appeared to be asleep, the sun reflecting off its scales and highlighting the gouges and scratch marks rent into its thick hide. “We’ll go more into detail back in the room.” He said, starting back toward the path. “We’ve been here long enough.”


End file.
